Big-wave surfer Billy Kemper is one guy who has a lot to look forward to during the winter surf season. He’s feeling stronger, faster and tougher than ever as the surf season enters its final phase on Oahu’s North Shore.

“This is to me the World Series of surfing. It’s our playoffs,” he said, “I basically don’t want to stop my peak. I want to stay peaked for two months straight now. Surfing, you never know if you’re going to be competing or not. You wake up in the morning and within an hour of daylight, they make the call: ‘OK, contest is on!’”

Unless he’s called away to a competition — Jaws was beckoning during our interview — Kemper, currently ranked No. 13 on the World Surf League’s Big Wave Tour, will talk story in Haleiwa this weekend, describing how it’s done. The legendary Sunny Garcia, who at age 46 finished 17th in the recent HIC Pro Sunset Beach, will also appear at the session as part of the lead-up to the 2016 Vans Triple Crown, scheduled to take place between Saturday and Dec. 20 at Haleiwa, Sunset Beach and Pipeline.

Kemper reached the third round of the HIC Pro Sunset Beach. Like a true pro athlete, he’s analytical about his performance, feeling that he surfed well but made some strategic errors that cost him a better finish. “I didn’t play defense,” he said, meaning that he didn’t use his position to block other surfers from catching a good ride.

Last December, the Maui native sent the surfing world a message by taking the first ever Peahi Big Wave Challenge, held in 40- to 60-foot swells at the site commonly called Jaws. With a big swell at Jaws projected for just around press time for this publication, he could take a shot at his second title by the time you read this.

As Kemper went through his workout earlier this week, his stoke was surprisingly casual. “I’m not going out there to repeat, or anything like that,” he said. “I think there are a lot of people out there who have the wrong idea, the mentality about surfing out there. They’re out there to win awards, but this is truly what me and my friends love to do. Whether the money and sponsors and all that stuff wasn’t here, we’d still be doing that at the end of the day. It’s my back yard. It’s what I love to do, and no one’s going to stop me from doing it.”

It’s not difficult to figure out that Jaws is a tough place to surf — for years, it was a tow-in and windsurfing spot, giving the board rider either mechanical or wind power to get in — or out – of a wave. Surfers started paddling in only about five years ago.

Kemper, now 26, started towing into Jaws at age 15, and now that he’s paddling in, he knows the frustration of struggling all day, trying to catch a single wave. “It’s the hardest wave in the world to paddle into, without a doubt,” he said. “Basically you’re just head down, fighting for the wave of your life.”

Then there’s the actual surfing at Jaws, catching and riding down the steep, fast, often wind-blown and always gnarly wave. Mention it to Kemper, though, and a smile comes across his face.

“It’s funny; it’s like back to life in those North Shore movies,” he said. “It truly is an unexplainable feeling and an adrenaline rush, feeling that you’re conquering fear. You’ve overcome your fear, and basically capitalized on the situation that presents itself, at that second.

“It’s Mother Nature. You’re never going to have that opportunity again.”